This episode is an interview with intelligence analyst Judy Towers and Michael Goedekr, CEO of hackdefnet, conducted over the summer at DEFCON 25 in Las Vegas (2017). Judy and Michael share their thoughts on threat intelligence, risk analysis, dealing with C suite executives and more.

Ray Watson

This episode’s guest is Ray Watson who presented at Black Hat 2017. He joins me to talk about hacker history and share some of his infosec pet peeves. We recorded this interview in July 2017 during the week of Black Hat and DEFCON in Las Vegas. His talk was entitled “Jedi Masters, Sith Lords, and Droids: 5 Generations of Hacking” and can be seen in it’s entirety below.

Join BrightTALK and check out this informative panel discussion featuring myself along with panelists Nathan Wenzler and Kowsik Guruswamy.

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A massive phishing campaign targeting Google accounts ripped through the internet on a Wednesday afternoon in early May. Phishing scams are pretty common. What sets this scam apart is that it is more convincing than most. The email takes users who click on the file to a legitimate Google sign-in screen to grant permissions. If you received the email or are concerned you might be targeted next, join this interactive Q&A panel to get the facts and protect your account and your organization.

We discuss:
– What is the Google Docs email scam?
– How is this scam different from other phishing scams?
– What’s the deal with Eugene Pupov?
– Who’s at risk and how can you avoid being a victim?
– What can we expect in the future?

Laurie is host of CNN’s first CNNgo original, Mostly Human with Laurie Segall, a 6-part investigative docuseries, exploring sex, love, death & humanity through the lens of tech.

Mostly Human follows Laurie around the world as she tackles the uncomfortable questions about our increasingly complicated relationship with technology. She examines the power modern technology holds, while exposing the darker side.

1 – Dead, IRL

Using thousands of texts, tweets and Facebook posts, a woman creates a digital version of her best friend … after he died. Artificial intelligence and years of social media data allowed her to create a bot that responds like her best friend, jokes like him, and blurs the lines between man and machine. This is death in the digital age.

2 – Hacker down: ISIS’ Twitter star

An investigation into the first person deemed dangerous enough to kill… because of his ability to tweet. We explore the life and death of Junaid Hussain, the ISIS hacker who ushered in a new era of terror, mainly due to his social media celebrity. We infiltrate hacker circles in Vegas, explore undercover operations, and have a dangerous run-in outside his hometown, to understand how he went from computer nerd to third most dangerous member of ISIS.

3 – I love you, Bot

Westworld, or real world? From people falling in love with robots to sex dolls who now have, “AI brains,” our relationship with tech is getting…complicated. We explore a sexual assault in the virtual world and Minority Report technology being used in a high security psychiatric ward. It’s too controversial for the US and will blow your mind.

4 – Silicon Valley’s dark secret

Dig into the myth of Silicon Valley – where heroes are hailed and success celebrated. Silicon Valley has a secret they don’t want you to know about. Much of the creative genius, the brainiac success stories are also associated with depression and bi-polar disorder. Is there a price to creative genius?

5 – Swipe, Click, Cheat

Explore the human impact of a hack that exposed 36 million potential cheaters. Behind the hack, there were suicides, broken families. We introduce you to the human impact of Ashley Madison and take our viewers inside the War Room of Ashley Madison where there were millions of dollars on the table, death threats, and a ticking time bomb that would explode with society’s secrets. We’ll also look at the company’s secret: their ability to program algorithms that would make you more likely to click-for-affair.

6 – Electric Sheep

A look at why the most powerful people in tech are stepping away from the products they’ve built. In a place where algorithms play god, we explore the soul searching Silicon Valley is doing. The biggest CEO’s are raising the alarm bells and wondering – have we entered the singularity? Who’s in control… man or machine?

Another year, another wave of security incidents and threat models to keep the cybersecurity industry busy. So there was plenty to discuss and share as the InfoSec community flocked to San Francisco for the annual RSA Conference last month.

A view from the escalator as I descend into the bowels of RSAC 2017.

As always, the latest trends in the industry were addressed. Large data breaches, quickly growing threat models, security education, political hacking, and the risks posed by the Internet of Things were common threads throughout many of the keynotes, sessions, workshops, expos, and general chatter among attendees.

RSAC has more of a trade show feel compared to other security conferences so I’ve learned over the years that it’s best to approach the conference as an opportunity to meet and network with industry experts. This year I spent less time attending the talks and more time meeting with the players in the industry who are there to make deals and form partnerships.

Throughout the week I was lucky to catch up with several industry professionals representing some of the top tier firms in the cybersecurity sector who shared their take on the challenges and trends facing cybersecurity firms, their clients, and end users.

This episode of the podcast features interviews collected at RSAC 2017.